The War in Algeria: Islam: The Portrait of an Intellectual

Not only are the people of Algeria underemployed and undernourished, but they are frustrated in almost every attempt to escape as individuals from the dismal fate of idleness. Like the conquered Poles in Hitler’s Germanic Empire, the Mohammedans of Algeria seem to be systematically denied any education or training in the skills of Western technology; they have practically no Arabic schools of their own or Arabic press, but at the same time so few French schools, especially in the inland mountainous areas, that they are deprived of almost every opportunity to acquire French culture as an alternative to Arab culture.

The result of such a situation is that a very limited class of privileged Moslem stooges, known in Algiers slang as the Benoui-oui or “sons of yes-yes,” acquires a French education and becomes associated with the French in exploiting the population. Only from time to time does an Arab with a thoroughly French education have enough character and id...